Webber, Sandino Moreno, and Hawke at last night’s screening.Photo: Getty Images
There was a screening and after-party for Ethan Hawke’s second directorial feature, The Hottest State, at the Tribeca Film Center last night, and the movie’s director and stars and friends — Hawke, Robert Sean Leonard, Sonia Braga, Catalina Sandino Moreno, and newcomer Mark Webber, around whom the movie revolves — were all there. It’s a romantic, slightly disturbing — and slightly familiar — look at obsessive love and elusive objects of desire. And so we asked Webber, who plays the slacker-actor who falls crazy-in-love with a sweet singer, if he has a current obsessive love. “iPhone is a problem,” he admitted, the comely lady at his side notwithstanding. “It’s an issue.”
And it’s not Webber’s first brush with technobsession, as it turns out. “When Nintendo came out the first time, with Duck Hunt and the guns and all that,” he said, “when I got that I totally lost my mind.” And it might be even worse with the iPhone, because not even a gifting suite — or Hawke — can help him get one. “I thought you could just go to the store, but no,” Webber said. “My friend knows some guy, Punjabi Mark, who’s like an Indian gangster dude with a list.” Um, hey, could you maybe hook us up with Punjabi Mark, too? —Justin Ravitz
Hear more from Ethan Hawke, Robert Sean Leonard, Sonia Braga, and more on our Interactive Party Lines.
